I\u2014grifter-reaper, gleaner, griever of vermin\u2014wade
\nthrough famine to find the thread that will fit mine eye.<\/p>\n
As if an antidote of the utmost motherly doting,
\nor self-loathing, I start in the bog, blow cobalt bubbles<\/p>\n
with the frogs. Its lager is my fetal lake. Do you hate me
\nas I wax hectic-poetic on the cardinal: his crimson<\/p>\n
incarnadines something as seemless as the sky,
\nblood-pierces the blue broadside as I go earthward<\/p>\n
to find the germ in the charm of eons of churned
\ndeath. Now, over it, build a deck. A cavernous space.<\/p>\n
Build a personhood confounded into a continuum.
\nAdd mnemonic material and I\u2019m a \u201cme\u201d. I can see<\/p>\n
my past. Each lived moment tries to placate
\nthe impossible. Replace this moment<\/p>\n
with the moment in the mind. In it, I\u2019m not
\nmuzzle-imminent, terminal-internal. Not passive.<\/p>\n
I choose things. I lose things. What if I\u2019d said crow
\ninstead of cardinal. Said cow. I can outlast what I lack.<\/p>\n
Can I outlast my lacks, echolalic as tracks in snow,
\nas I slink never more core-ward than in the compost\u2019s<\/p>\n
overwrought rot apocalypse, tentacling like a sketch
\ninto the dross, into the rich filth, as if rewriting itself.<\/p>\n
Its errata. Into what it truly always was. Rattled at
\nthe blast site but Intact as an instant is for an instance.<\/p>\n
Then forever slant. Noctambulant, needly with no sleep,
\nI cross into the dustheap with my serpentine refinement.<\/p>\n
Real go-getter: quell the compliment to make
\nyour inner-snake feel better, feel the ebullience<\/p>\n
of an all-spine body as it glides into the rubbish,
\nlush with elucidation. The moral sense<\/p>\n
of a shed bull skin inside your small animal body.
\nAt sunset, the sun\u2019s undone into a peachy imperson-<\/p>\n
ation of itself. In the cartoons, the lightbulb petrifies
\nthe idea, places a lit lemon above the clarified head.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s not what we have here. Nestled in the necro-
\ncrevice of an earthquake, I toast the venom<\/p>\n
of this new heaven. I build my nest with what the bull-
\ndozer pushes. Buried in the heap is a belief like blacktop<\/p>\n
on the arid earth, a beak on a plastic berry. An onyx-
\nwinged toxin of what was once a bird. I search<\/p>\n
the reek until I find its feather, a bellwether,
\nan umbilical tetherling. Create pictographs of the life-<\/p>\n
ash, hieroglyphs in high gloss on an already lost rock.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I\u2014grifter-reaper, gleaner, griever of vermin\u2014wade through famine to find the thread that will fit mine eye. As if an antidote of the utmost motherly doting, or self-loathing, I start in the bog, blow cobalt bubbles with the frogs. Its lager is my fetal lake. Do you hate me as I wax hectic-poetic on the cardinal: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2292,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[81],"tags":[25],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Jypy-4Vg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18926"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18926"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18958,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18926\/revisions\/18958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}